My version of the ending to the seventh book
by hollybridgetpeppermint
Summary: It's actually a newspaper article, for once Rita Skeeter gets it right I don't know why I did that but I couldn't really think of another columnist...anywho yup the title tells all


The Daily Prophet

"The Chosen One" is, indeed, just that

Potter defeats You-Know-Who; rumor proved true

He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is dead, _writes Rita Skeeter, Special Correspondent for the Daily Prophet, _and we all know who has finally defeated him.

Since his escapade at the Ministry of Magic two years ago, seventeen-year-old Harry Potter has been rumored to be "The Chosen One," the one who was destined to kill You-Know-Who. Now, this rumor has been proved true in a stunning and spectacular turn of events, the like of which has never been seen before.

Chased by You-Know-Who since he was one year old, Harry has faced extreme challenges from the beginning. When his parents were killed by the evil Dark wizard, he was taken in by his Muggle relatives, Vernon and Petunia Dursley. They were very unkind to him, so when eleven-year-old Harry was told that he was a wizard, and could go off to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry instead of living with his tyrannical aunt and uncle, he was elated.

Once at Hogwarts, Harry showed that he was his father's boy by exhibiting an amazing talent for Quidditch. This was not all he could do, however. At the end of his first year, this remarkable boy faced down He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named a second time, keeping the evil wizard from stealing the Sorcerer's Stone, whose Elixir of Life would allow You-Know-Who to become immortal. Harry successfully drove You-Know-Who away, and, in so doing, proved that he was, indeed, worthy of the fame given him.

In his second year, young Harry once again faced He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named; a younger version, a memory, but still quite as dangerous as ever. In the process, Harry saved the life of a fellow student, one Ginny Weasley, the sister of Harry's best friend. Ginny later became Harry's girlfriend.

This pattern continued throughout Harry's years at Hogwarts. Each year, this incredible, indefatigable spirit was tested in combat against You-Know-Who or one of his supporters. (Yours truly asked him how he did this, but his only comment was, "Forget that! Say Voldemort!") In Harry's third year, he discovered that Sirius Black, who was recently proved innocent by the capture of the man he was thought to have killed, was actually Harry's godfather, and that Peter Pettigrew, the man Black had supposedly murdered, had betrayed Harry's parents to You-Know-Who. In his fourth year, Harry, despite the age limit set that year by the Ministry of Magic, participated in the Triwizard Tournament, which led him to a place where he was forced to watch You-Know-Who regain a body, while Harry's valiant efforts to stop this did no good. In Harry's fifth year, he endured the taunts of almost everyone in the Wizarding world, all of whom thought he was lying about his adventures. At the end of this year, he also had the aforesaid escapade at the Ministry, which proved that he was not lying when Cornelius Fudge, then the Minister of Magic, saw You-Know-Who with his own eyes. When Harry was sixteen, he helped Albus Dumbledore retrieve an object which apparently aided in the process of killing He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named (Harry still will not disclose any more information about this, as he promised Dumbledore, who, most unfortunately, died just after retrieving this object, that Harry would not tell anyone what they were doing). And now Harry has finally achieved what has been, some say, his sole purpose in life: defeating and killing You-Know-Who.

Now that Harry has done this, he has come back to Hogwarts for a visit (during what should have been his seventh year, he didn't attend Hogwarts at all, but roamed around finding and destroying the objects which were so crucial to the task of destroying You-Know-Who). Hogwarts is where we find him now, surrounded and admired by all the students there.

"You could take the place of Dumbledore!" pipes up one admiring voice. The crowd murmurs among themselves, pleased by this idea. But Harry shakes his head.

"No," he says. "I could never take Dumbledore's place. For me to be thought of as a replacement Dumbledore would be an insult to his memory. Dumbledore was a great and noble man, and he did more for the cause of defeating Voldemort--" here a whisper sweeps through the crowd, and is quickly hushed—"than anyone else here."

"What about you?" asks another voice.

Harry shakes his head, with a strange-sounding laugh. "Me?" he says. "No. I really didn't do much. All I did was perform the spell needed to kill him. It's people like Dumbledore, people like Sirius Black, who worked for their cause, and made sacrifices, sometimes even the greatest sacrifice—death—it's people like them who really killed Voldemort. People who died so that others could live. People like Cedric Diggory." His voice is quiet now. "People like my parents."

There is a rustle in the throng, and slowly the bodies part to let Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, Harry's two best friends, who were with him and helped when he killed He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, through. A second later, Ginny Weasley, Harry's girlfriend, also comes up to stand beside him.

"Yeah!" she says. "Harry's absolutely right."

Everyone grows quiet as the crowd absorbs this information. Then a third voice speaks.

"So what are you saying—that Harry's not great?" asks this student.

Ron Weasley takes up the tale. "No!" he says. "That's not what we're saying at all! It's just that…" He trails off and looks at Harry.s

"Listen," says Harry. "I may be considered a good wizard or whatever, but I'm not the only one who killed Voldemort. And you may think I'm as good as Dumbledore or something—"

"You are!" says a student, and there are nods and murmurs of agreement throughout the crowd.

"Right, well, that's as may be," Harry tells them, "but that's not the point. The point is, saying I could take Dumbledore's place, no matter whether I could or not, is not fair to him. It's like—hey, Lavender?" This last is to Lavender Brown, a Gryffindor student in his own year.

"What?" she says.

"Do you remember when that baby rabbit you had died?"

"Yes," says Lavender, a little uncertain.

"Did you ever get a new rabbit?" Harry asks.

"Yes," Lavender tells him, confused.

"Did that rabbit make you forget Binky?"

"No."

"Did you stop wishing you had Binky back?"

"No," Lavender says to Harry, now thoroughly bewildered.

"Well, it's like that," says Harry, now addressing the other students again. "If I were to take Dumbledore's place, that would be like saying that we didn't care about him, that he was just a thing to us, easily replaced. And if that's what he was to anyone here, they shouldn't bother staying, and can leave now!"

No one moves, and Harry continues.

"You see why it would disrespectful to Dumbledore's memory for me to 'take his place.' Dumbledore was his own person, and I couldn't replace him any more than Lavender's new rabbit could replace her old one. So everyone—" Here he pauses, as if unsure of what to say next, then finds words and continues.

"Remember Dumbledore. Remember everything he did to make us safe. And remember everyone else who did anything to help this cause, so that someday, somewhere, someone would be able to defeat Voldemort. Just because that someone happened to be me doesn't mean I could take anyone's place, especially not one of those who deserves his own place most. I say to you now what Dumbledore said three years ago about Cedric Diggory. Remember all of them. Remember Dumbledore."

As Harry finishes speaking, an unearthly music is heard, and a beautiful red-and-gold phoenix soars from among the clouds and alights on Harry's shoulder. Harry looks at the bird, and his mouth drops open.

"Fawkes?" he asks softly. Then, louder, to Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, "It's Fawkes. Dumbledore's phoenix."

"Loyalty to Dumbledore, Harry," says Hermione in an

awestruck whisper. "You were…so incredibly loyal just now, and he knew, and—and came back."

There is dead silence for a moment, while Harry stokes the phoenix's soft plumage. Then applause breaks out among the students, and Harry takes Ginny's hand and smiles at her. Fawkes takes off and flies overhead, picturesque against the bright blue sky.

As phoenix song fills the air, Harry and his friends stand happily together hearing the applause—applause for Ron, Hermione, and Ginny, applause for Dumbledore, and applause for Harry Potter, the Chosen One, the Man Who Lived.


End file.
